pronounced: ROH-suh hydrid tea
Roses are the most popular flowering plant in the world. Garden cultivation of roses began about 5,000 years ago, probably in China. During Roman times, roses were grown extensively in the Middle East. They were used as confetti at celebrations, for medicinal purposes, and as a source of perfume. Members of the Roman nobility established large public rose gardens in the south of Rome. During the 15th century, the rose became the symbol for the factions fighting for the control of England. The white rose symbolized York, the red rose Lancaster, and the conflicts became known as the Wars of the Roses. A famous rose garden was established in the early 1800s at Château de Malmaison, an estate seven miles west of Paris, by Napoleon’s wife, Josephine.
The word rose comes from the Latin rosa, adapted from the Greek 'ροδον (rhodon), which in turn was adapted from earlier Aramaic and Hebrew words for the plant. The Greek word will be familiar to many gardeners from the plant Rhododendron, which literally means ‘rose tree’.
Attar of Roses is the steam-extracted essential oil from rose flowers, and has been used in perfumes for centuries. Rose water, made from the oil, is widely used in Asian and Middle Eastern cuisine. The French use rose syrup, made from an extract of rose petals. In the USA, this syrup is used to make rose scones.
Hybrid Tea is a cultivar group of roses. The first Hybrid Tea is reckoned to have been La France in 1867. It was raised by Jean-Baptiste Guillot, a French nurseryman. He hybridized an old Chinese garden tea rose with a European rose. La France still survives, available from specialist nurseries. Some Hybrid Teas have become a legend, like Peace, hybridized in France just before World War II. It was reportedly sent to the USA on the last plane that left France before the German invasion. Safely propagated by the Conard Pyle Company in the USA during the war, it was introduced to the world in 1945.
Once a Hybrid Tea variety is developed, it is propagated by budding, a technique that involves grafting buds from the parent plant on to strongly growing root stocks such as Rosa multiflora. Hybrid Teas grow a single rose on a long stem, and are ideal for florists’ use. Most varieties lack fragrance, and can be difficult to grow in a home garden due to a lack of disease resistance and susceptibility to cold temperatures.
‘Candy Stripe’ is a large-flowered Hybrid Tea that produces fragrant, 60-petal blooms. These are a hard shade of pink, striped with blush. The leaves are large, and leathery dark green, alternate and pinnately compound. They are, as with most roses, ovate with finely toothed edges.
This might be a good place to make a few remarks on the subject of thorns. Thorns are modified leaves, and roses don’t have them! What roses do have are prickles, sickle-shaped hooks which are outgrowths of the outer layer of tissue of the stems.
